All info you need to see before the 2022 Spanish GP starts
The 2022 Formula 1 World Championship season is set to continue with the 2022 Spanish Grand Prix at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya. The sixth round of the season could be one that shows what we could expect for the rest of the year, and it could also be a good place to test how the new cars can really follow each other through tight corners, with Barcelona often being a track that doesn’t allow for much overtaking.
Very close at the top
Now, it has been confirmed that the 2022 F1 calendar will have 22 races as the cancelled 2022 Russian Grand Prix will not be replaced.
Ferrari and Red Bull have really been closely matched on several of the races celebrated so far, but Red Bull seems to be a step ahead recently, with solid performances at Imola and in the most recent Grand Prix in Miami.
Charles Leclerc continues to lead the World Drivers’ Championship for Ferrari with his two wins, but Max Verstappen and his Red Bull have taken three victories in the season and have closed Leclerc’s lead to just 19 points, even though the Dutchman has retired from a couple of events.
Sergio Pérez has done well for Red Bull and sits third in the WDC, ahead of Mercedes’ George Russell and Ferrari’s Spaniard Carlos Sainz.
Sainz will be on a race-winning car on home soil for the first time in his eight-year Formula 1 career and is really needing to put up a big result to help Ferrari and possibly look at a possible title fight for himself.
Can Mercedes join the party at the front?
Barcelona could be crucial for most teams, especially Mercedes, in terms of the upgrades and how teams can really improve their cars. Mercedes is expected to bring improvements for the W13 for the upcoming race at Spain, and it could certainly make or break the team’s campaign and decide whether the German squad can get into the championship mix.
George Russell driving in front of Lewis Hamilton during the 2022 MIami F1 GP
As of now, George Russell has made the best of every favourable opportunity that has been presented to him this year and is fourth in the championship with 59 points (45 behind Leclerc), with the seven-time World Champion Lewis Hamilton sixth with 36 points and lots of negative situations so far.
Behind the Top 3 in the World Constructors’ Championship, McLaren (Lando Norris and Daniel Ricciardo) remains fourth despite coming from a race without points in the USA.
Valtteri Bottas continues to score for Alfa Romeo and is coming off a seventh-spot finish at Miami and has his team fourth in the WCC with 31 points. Bottas’ teammate, rookie Guanyu Zhou, could not score in the Miami weekend and has one point in the year.
Alpine (Esteban Ocon and Fernando Alonso) remains fifth among constructors’ with Ocon scoring 24 of the team’s 26 points so far.
AlphaTauri (Pierre Gasly and Yuki Tsunoda), Haas (Kevin Magnussen and Mick Schumacher), Aston Martin (Lance Stroll and Sebastian Vettel), and Williams (Alex Albon and Nicholas Latifi) round out the positions of the World Constructors’ Championship.
Among the bottom four teams, AlphaTauri and Haas did not score in the most recent Grand Prix, but Aston Martin and Williams did manage to put one of their cars in the Top 10, with Alex Albon finishing ninth for Williams and Stroll scoring a couple of points for Aston Martin.
2022 Spanish GP Facts & Figures
This event will be celebrated on May 22nd and will be the 62nd Spanish Grand Prix in history.
The first Spanish Grand Prix was held in 1913. The race was part of the pre-war World Manufacturers’ Championship and the European Championship in 1927 and 1935, respectively.
Juan Manuel Fangio
The race on Sunday will be the 51st World Championship Spanish Grand Prix. The first-ever World Championship of Drivers’ race in Spain was at Pedralbes in 1951 when Juan Manuel Fangio’s 18-inch tyres proved to be too much against Ferrari’s 16-inch tyres and the Argentine emerged with the win and his first World title.
The race was sporadically in the championship during the early years. It took place in 1954 before disappearing for over a decade. It made its return in 1968 with Graham Hill winning for an emotional Lotus team at Jarama, as Jim Clark had died weeks before and that race was the first after the tragic loss of the Scottish legend.
Jarama and Montjuic hosted nine and four World Championship Grands Prix, respectively, between 1967 and 1981, with Jarama also hosting non-championship races in 1967 and 1980. At Montjuic, in 1975, a dark day occurred after a rear-wing failure in Rolf Stommelen’s Hill car caused an accident that tragically took the lives of four spectators.
The race again disappeared from the calendar for several years before returning in 1986, at Jerez de la Frontera.
Ayrton Senna and Nigel Mansell provided a great fight for the win in 1986, with the Brazilian beating Mansell by just 0.014 seconds. In 1990, Martin Donnelly suffered a big crash in his Lotus which ended his career as he suffered major leg injuries and brain and lung contusions.
Barcelona arrived in the Formula 1 championship in 1991 and the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya has hosted the Spanish Grand Prix ever since and it will be hosting its 32nd straight Grand Prix.
Max Verstappen celebrates his first F1 win with Daniel Ricciardo of Australia and Red Bull Racing Team
The track has provided some awesome moments, like Mansell and Senna again battling with just inches between their cars in 1991 or Michael Schumacher’s stunning win in the wet 1996 GP, which was the first of his 72 wins for Ferrari. Also, Williams took its last win to date in Barcelona, with Pastor Maldonado shocking the paddock in 2012.
Fernando Alonso took his last GP win to date at Barcelona in 2013, whilst Max Verstappen’s first-ever win was in Spain in 2016, after Hamilton and Nico Rosberg’s Mercedes collided at the start.
Schumacher and Hamilton are the all-time leaders in terms of wins in Spain, with six apiece.
Hamilton has taken victory in Spain the last five seasons, but his streak might be coming to an end in 2022, provided Mercedes doesn’t fix its car for the upcoming race.
Regarding teams, Ferrari has been the most successful in Spain, recording 12 wins.
Mercedes, on its side, has won nine races in Spain, and seven of those came during championship races.
McLaren and Williams have eight wins each, though one of Williams’ triumphs was in the 1980 non-championship race.
Red Bull won three times in Spain, with Mark Webber in 2010, Vettel in 2011, and Verstappen’s maiden victory in 2016.
Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya info
A challenging track, the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya is a 4.675 km park with 16 corners. It probably is one of the places drivers and teams know to perfection since winter testing usually takes place at the venue.
The track is aerodynamically demanding while having a long straight, which makes the setup aspect a very difficult one. Its layout has been slightly altered over the years, with a slower Turn 10 (La Caixa) added instead of a sweeping left-hander in 2004. Also, the final sector was originally fast, with the last two corners being two sweeping right-handers. In 2007, a chicane in the final sector was added.
For the 2021 event, the track suffered a new change in the Turn 10 (La Caixa) as the corner was given a new shape that resembles a bit of the original track layout, and the change was made to enhance safety in that sector. It really didn’t change much in terms of racing quality in the 2021 event.
The lap records for the track in its new layout are held by Lewis Hamilton (1:16.741 min in the 2021 qualifying - outright record) and Max Verstappen (Fastest Lap during the 2021 race: 1:18.149 min).
2022 Spanish Grand Prix - Tyres
The dry tyres for the 2022 Spanish Grand Prix will be the C1 as P Zero White hard, C2 as P Zero Yellow Medium, and C3 as P Zero Red soft.
Pirelli explained their choice with a statement in a press release: “Pirelli brings the hardest tyres in the 2022 range to the race where it is title sponsor in Spain, with the C1 as the P Zero White hard, C2 as the P Zero Yellow medium, and C3 as the P Zero Red soft. It’s a pretty straightforward choice – which is the same as last year, albeit using a brand-new family of tyres – with the demands of the Barcelona circuit being extremely well-known from testing and previous races. These famously include the long Turn 3 as well as Turn 9: all corners that put a lot of energy through the tyres.
The teams were at Barcelona as recently as February, three months ago, for pre-season testing. However, there are three big differences to consider: firstly, the teams concentrated on testing compounds in the middle of the range back then rather than the hard; secondly, weather conditions were much cooler; and thirdly, the new cars were in their most basic launch specification.
The cars have moved on considerably since then, and it’s going to be interesting to see how much that improvement actually is with the latest upgrades.
With Barcelona being a very well-used circuit, there’s not going to be a huge amount of track evolution expected over the course of the weekend, thanks to a busy schedule of support races too.
Temperatures should be dry and warm, adding to the heavy demands placed on the tyres. The track itself is unchanged compared to last year, when Turn 10 was modified, slightly increasing the overall length of the circuit.
Last year’s winning strategy was a two-stopper, the traditional approach to Barcelona, with Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton triumphing from pole using a soft-medium-medium strategy. Soft-medium-soft was used by all the finishers from P2 to P8.”
The minimum starting pressures will be 22.5 psi (front) and 19.0 psi (rear).
2022 Spanish Grand Prix - Weather Forecast
Friday, May 20th - FP1 & FP2
Conditions: Very warm with plenty of sun
Max. temperature: 30°C
Chance of rain: 0%
Saturday, May 21st - FP3 & Qualifying
Conditions: Very warm with some sun
Max. temperature: 33°C
Chance of rain: 0%
Sunday, May 22nd - Race
Conditions: Hot with clouds and sun
Max. temperature: 34°C
Chance of rain: 0%
Who will be on the 2022 Spanish Grand Prix podium?
The 2022 Spanish Grand Prix could become one of the most remembered races of the year if the pecking order starts to look different from this point on. Obviously, if Mercedes is expected to bring updates, we can expect the rest of the teams continue to develop their machines and remain as competitive, mainly Ferrari and Red Bull.
Podium of the 2021 Spanish F1 GP: 1. Hamilton, 2. Verstappen & 3. Bottas
There could be some drama in terms of the development race and the budget cap, but that could be a big side story for the rest of the season.
Another if. If Mercedes can manage to join the fight at the front, the team could still have time to recover its point deficit against the rivals in both championships, but on the other side, it could really be the weekend that proves the team got it completely wrong with its car concept if even an expected upgrade package isn’t enough.
The prediction for the top three of the 2022 Spanish Grand Prix is 1. Charles Leclerc, 2. Max Verstappen, 3. Lewis Hamilton.
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